Anybody know anything about the United States Postal Service conducting a "Mail Measurement Study" for quality control purposes: Supposedly conducted by IBM, and volunteer sign-up via reportez.com?

I received a piece of snail mail the other day from them which seemed a bit suspicious.
The paper has the United States Postal Service logo header on it, and although it is personally addressed to me (sort of -- first initial, last name, address), the greeting is "Dear Postal Customer."

The piece goes on to invite me to take part in a volunteer study to report the delivery of my mail. The promised reward for participation is "points redeemable for gift certificates.

A URL is provided: http://www.reportez.com , along with an 800 number for the Mail Measurement Study. The letter goes on to say that IBM has been contracted to conduct the study. They also provide the phone number of a USPS representative supposedly connected with the study.

Sorry for the long background. I googled reportez.com and came up with a few other forum questions from people like me wondering if they are legit. Apart from a BBB listing & "no complains," there was precious little.

Does anyone know about this? Is it a scam? If not, they certainly did a good job of making it look suspicious!

West Corporation, the company that owns reportez.com also owns annualcreditreport.com and several "work at home" based websites. Also, the USPS web site shows no search results for "West Coproration" or reportez .

Apparently there is in fact something called the Mailing Services Measurement, and IBM is somehow involved, based on their emplem being on the official site. In general, government agencies do sometimes contract out satifaction surveys, so that itself is not a deal-breaker.

I have no idea if your thing is legit, but I suggest you call a number from the USPS and ask them, rather than the number listed in the mailing. Similar to if you get something suspicious claiming to be your bank, call a number that you know if for your bank rather than teh one sent to you in an email.

My knee-jerk reaction to this is that they want to "test" the USPS by sending you a bunch of crap including coupons and "special offers." It's kinda like what they already do, but as an active participant you'll be telling them some things about your habits as a consumer. Consider it "interactive spam."

I took part in that study several years ago (the same web page, actually). You got a bunch of test mailings from them, which you saved and sent back to them with an SASE. The mailings had no advertising in them -- just a card identifying the sender.

You did earn points for prizes; I picked one or two of them during my time.

There were no scams, no problems, and I would have continued to take part if they hadn't told me they were discontinuing it.

I've managed to recall how it worked: You'd get letters and postcards (maybe about 30 a month). Each had a slip in them with an ID number. You'd then report the ID number and the date received to the website. You'd keep the letters for three months, then discard them. Occasionally, they'd ask you to send a particular letter back to them; they'd supply a business reply envelope.

At the end of a year, they'd send you a catalog where you could choose a prize.

The entire purpose was to do an outside audit of how fast mail is delivered. The USPS doesn't do it themselves because of the obvious conflict of interest.

I took part in that study several years ago (the same web page, actually). You got a bunch of test mailings from them, which you saved and sent back to them with an SASE. The mailings had no advertising in them -- just a card identifying the sender.

You did earn points for prizes; I picked one or two of them during my time.

There were no scams, no problems, and I would have continued to take part if they hadn't told me they were discontinuing it.

It's well worth doing.

Well, I note that this is a pretty old thread, but I'm going to resurrect it, since I have some new information to impart.

My wife and I are retired and live in northern Oklahoma in a small town of less than 10,000. We received a letter by snail-mail on Feb 20th this year, with an IBM letterhead. It stated that IBM had been hired to "measure the timeliness" of US mail in the area, and invited us to participate/assist with the study.
The compensation was not much, just $15 for each drop, (no points for prizes) but we wouldn't have been doing it to get rich anyway, just something to do and pick up a few bucks.

Like others on this thread, I was suspicious; I called the local post office to see if they were aware of this program. The postmaster indicated that he had heard of the program, that it was legit. So we went online to the specified URL and filled out their information, then waited. About a week ago, we received a phone call from a woman with a heavy accent, giving us details as to what to do, where to do the drops, etc. My wife asked how we would be paid, and the representative informed us that we would need to furnish our bank information so that IBM could make direct deposits to our account. When my wife said, "Oh no, that's not going to happen", send us a check!"

The representative promptly hung up.

Sorry, count me among those who lack confidence in anyone who tries to get me to give out my banking account information!

It is a legitimate company. You scan your mail you receive everyday. You are awarded points for doing this. You can use the points to buy gift cards or other merchandise.
I was a member for 5 years. It was worth my time as I used my points for for over $350 in gift cards.